Yosemite/Camping/Camp 4 strategy?

Hi All,

Wondering if anyone has some camping advice! I've been to the Valley and waited in the Camp 4 line for 2 hours once before, so I know that's often the drill. But what about this time of year (October)?

Option 1: We leave LA later Thursday evening and get to Yosemite proper around midnight. Can you arrive in the middle of the night? I'm guessing we'd have to boondock in my truck on the side of a road somewhere outside the park. This option would allow a super early arrival to Camp 4 but little sleep.

Option 2: Alpine start from LA, get to Yosemite around 10AM Friday morning depending on traffic. Secure camping and climb! However, can we find camping?

I've never been to any of the other campgrounds. Wawona might be a good plan B to Camp 4?

Any beta or suggestions would be much appreciated. Thanks!

Justin,

There are nicer camping options in Yosemite than Camp 4, and they can be reserved.

North Pines, Upper Pines and Lower Pines are in the valley. Even though they may be all full now for the dates you want, check back daily and sometimes spots open up due to cancellations.

recreation.gov

Edit: Search "Yosemite National Park" on the home page, then click "Campgrounds."

FrankPS wrote:Justin, There are nicer camping options in Yosemite than Camp 4, and they can be reserved. North Pines, Upper Pines and Lower Pines are in the valley. Even though they may be all full now for the dates you want, check back daily and sometimes spots open up due to cancellations. recreation.gov/unifSearchRe…

Thanks. I have checked and didn't find anything so far. I'll keep looking the next couple of days.

Camp 4 is appealing because of the community and stumbling distance to climbing and food. :)

There's camping options a few miles outside of the gate around El Portal and also camping off of fire roads outside the west gate. It's a little further than El portal but the upside is you don have to camp off the road.

I believe you can arrive in the middle of the night (gates are never closed). They will get you to pay on your way out if you don't already have a year long pass. If you get there in the middle of the night you could be one of the morally questionable people who sleeps in line at Camp 4. Otherwise try to show up at 5 am and get set up with a book and a headlamp. If you do this you should be fine.

Camp 4 was packed last week. Friday morning... ZERO spots available. I arrived at 3am and was #2 in line. The ranger squeezed out 5 spots luckily.

I always get in line before 4am to guarantee a spot. If you get in line before midnight, I hear the rangers will come by and ticket for illegal camping. It's difficult to tell with the current weather how busy it may be, but pulling up in the afternoon is risky. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

And in response to Alexander K ^^^ They have never once made me pay on the way out.

This is great, thanks everyone.

EricHat wrote:There's camping options a few miles outside of the gate around El Portal and also camping off of fire roads outside the west gate. It's a little further than El portal but the upside is you don have to camp off the road.

Around El Portal you're talking about the paid campgrounds, correct?

As far as the fire roads outside of the west gate, are you referring to the gate near El Portal? Or the one further north, off Hwy 120?

I should probably just find a California Gazeteer to see the roads and USFS land boundaries.

Thanks!

No, there are some spots right along the road where you'll see signs saying camping only allowed in designated spots. There's a couple of places by the river past el portal on the right hand side I've parked at, though I was in my vehicle.

When you exit the west gate out of the park on 120, headed towards groveland, about a mile out, is Evergreen road. Can't necessarily park and camp along the road, though I've seen it done. But there are fire roads.Also past evergreen, right across the street from the new Rush creek lodge is a fire road as well as fire roads behind the lodge. Rush creek also has food, a store, full bar, wifi, etc. All of this is in Stanislaus national forest and free but a little bit of a drive, unfortunately. But no waiting in lines at crazy hours.

EricHat wrote:No, there are some spots right along the road where you'll see signs saying camping only allowed in designated spots. There's a couple of places by the river past el portal on the right hand side I've parked at, though I was in my vehicle. When you exit the west gate out of the park on 120, headed towards groveland, about a mile out, is Evergreen road. Can't necessarily park and camp along the road, though I've seen it done. But there are fire roads.Also past evergreen, right across the street from the new Rush creek lodge is a fire road as well as fire roads behind the lodge. Rush creek also has food, a store, full bar, wifi, etc. All of this is in Stanislaus national forest and free but a little bit of a drive, unfortunately. But no waiting in lines at crazy hours.

That is pure gold, thank you very much for your time!!!

I'm planning on trying the same thing as the OP for Veteran's Day weekend (Nov 11th-13th). Never been to Yosemite before and it appears that all but one of the reservable campsites will be closed for the season by then.

Justin -- let me know how it goes when you are up there.

Justin was in LA for work and I flew in from Denver for the trip. I landed on Thursday night at LAX at about 6PM. We decided to stay in LA that night and left at 4:30 AM. We knew Camp 4 would be full but we were going that way to check it out anyways. The ranger said that people started to line up at 1:30 AM that "Morning". She let us know that the next day 27 spots could potentially be open. People can extend their stays though and right now you can stay for 30 days. All the other campgrounds were already full as well (we rolled up about 10 AM to the park).

After some climbing we decided to drive out towards El Portal. There is a pull off right across from the big hotel/motel complex. A bunch of people were staying there. That is where we stayed all 3 nights. It was free and ~20 min to the valley. A few people were putting up tents but most were in RV/van/truck setups. Justin has a Tundra setup to sleep in the back so we just slept back there, even though we had a tent. We were not hassled by anyone.

Since this was such an easy option we decided not to go get in the camp 4 line at 2 am Friday night.

There is a pretty good pizza place you can walk over to as well and a restaurant at the pull off. Since we really didn't plan dinners we just had pizza each night (soooooo lazy). $33 for Pizza with 5 veggies and pepperoni (4 slices each) and a beer each.

Camp 4 looked cool and all and I would love to try to stay there next time but the road was pretty easy.

Enjoy your trip out there Beau. EricHat thanks for the help, really came in handy.

Glad to hear your trip worked out well! I drove 8 hours out to Red Rocks NV to get rained on, then drove across the desert to Joshua Tree where we got 5 days of killer weather!!